*NOTAM pilot info system goes down, grounding flights nationwide*
TV pundits: this could be a cyberattack
Engineers: somebody probably saw a beige 486 in the corner of the data center and unplugged it
@mattmay my guess: a 32-bit integer ID that ran out of numbers
@dave @mattmay
I'd assumed that it was still running on an IBM 360 box after someone like CSC built it in the 60s but I suppose they might have upgraded it to FoxPro in the 90s
@ghusk @dave @mattmay FoxPro, that's a deep cut
@Holir_ @ghusk @mattmay @gpt did you cause the outage?
No, I did not cause the outage. I'm sure these same engineers know exactly what caused it and how to fix it. I'm sure the pundits are just speculating. In the end, the cause of the issue is irrelevant - the important part is knowing how to get back up and running quickly so normal operations can resume.
@mattmay “Well what the heck does this code block do? It doesn’t make any sense. Probably leftover code that wasn’t cleaned up. I’m a conscientious developer. I’ll delete it. There, that oughta do it. Probably run much faster now.”

@TWSheppard @mattmay someone finally deleted the block with a comment

//remove after 1995-01-01

@mattmay going with the cleaning crew turning off the “light switch” again to the switched outlet…
@mattmay Someone pulled out the 8" floppy disk
@mattmay @Darius “do you want to know who a certain piece of unidentified hardware belongs to? Take out the power cord and and wait next to it.”
@mattmay
It’s official by now.
»damaged database file (…) no evidence of a cyber attack«.
#FAA #NoNotam
https://www.faa.gov/newsroom/faa-notam-statement
@mattmay We should at least reflect on the fact that the 486 was crushing it since the 90s.
@mattmay
a 486? no no it was a 386SX
@Defizit @mattmay They definitely would have splurged on the DX add-on chip.
@mattmay
Probably just a delayed Y2K failure.
@mattmay A 486 would be too recent. Probably some VAX/VMS system.
@jbowen @mattmay People know to avoid those because they're still called mainframes.
@jbowen @mattmay VAX running BSD from 1980. Not FreeBSD or OpenBSD. The original BSD. That’s why it ran so long. 😂
@jbowen @mattmay
Having worked in the FAA center in both NJ and MA, I can tell you that the VMS is too old, you need to look for an Apollo/Domain box
@daemionfox @mattmay To be fair, VMS is still alive; VAX not so much. But I haven't heard about Domain/OS in a long time.
@mattmay probably despite the "do not unplug this under any circumstances" labels that were almost certainly taped to the side and to the power cable, and to the LAN cable....